Wangari Maathai, Kenya’s Assistant Minister for the Environment, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004.

Women are key agricultural producers in Kenya, contributing 75-80% of all labor in food production and 50% in cash crop production. They receive only 7% of agricultural extension information.

Approximately 30% of Kenyan women have undergone female genital cutting (FGC).

Some widows are forced to engage in risky sexual practices such as “wife inheritance,” where women are inherited by male in-laws, and ritual “cleansing,” where women are forced to have sex with men of low social standing.

Kenyan tradition allows a man to discipline his wife by physical means. No law in Kenya specifically prohibits spousal rape.

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